h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I am slowly launching a project on how to prevent kids from making a mess out of their lives. Being a father of three and having lost a cousin and a couple of friends and aquaintances (as well as nearly losing my own mind*) I feel that this is worth spending some efforts on.

I hope you feel the same and will help me with relevant informations and advice. Thank you in advance!

From my own experience I can say that it's easy to show and tell kids how dangerous drugs can be - but at the same time they are confronted with a lot of stories from their friends on how fantastic life on drugs can be. The difficulty lies in teaching the kids to stay on the right side of a very fine line.

I have not told my own kids much about drugs yet. The reason is that I am not proud of what I have done myself when I was younger. More important: If I tell them that I used quite a lot of cannabis, speed and LSD and (seemingly) got away with it unharmed - would I not tempt them to take the risc themselves?

Enough said for now, I guess. I am looking forward to read your postings!



(*some may think I lost it all - I hope I have proved them wrong by this posting )

Hm, I just realised that my first entry could give the impression that I am now an old, stuffy monk. So I'd better let you know right away that while I seldom use cannabis these days I often raise a cup or two or three or four... (yes, even in RL). I stopped smoking forever though a couple of weeks ago since my astma returned after a pause of 45 years

Sorry to hear about the return of your asthma, many of my friends and relatives suffer quite badly from it. In regard to the previous topic, me and almost all of my friends used to take a copious amount of drugs and drink very heavily. Then one day a small group of us just got bored. Quite literally the drugs didnt work, being sober was more of a novelty and the world seemed interesting and worth looking at unblurred. I quit alchohol and cannabis (the list is much longer but i cant spell most of them) about two years ago. None of us have really turned back. Unfortunately it was only a small group of us and the friends we left behind have gone way, way downhill.

God that was depressing wasnt it!!??

You know, I think it was...

In our "fine" United States, we have programs to keep kids off drugs-- at young ages, in school, we have puppets talk to us about how dangerous drugs are... and how to say no to drugs, and what drugs will do to you-- and that's it not a lovely sight sleeping in and chocking on your own throw-up after drinking.

Can't say this actually DOES anything... I worked for me, but failed as far as keeping my older brother from cigarettes-- the irony being that HE was adamant about getting our father to sign a contract professing he would stop smoking himself.

Smoking upsets me a great deal, as... well, we naturally tend to get upset about what is closest to our own lives. Drugs are disgusting. They have always been portrayed as such, and not even glorified by the fact that a good deal of the creative gods I adore-- the BEATLES, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison-- did them. DID them. I feel such a kinship to the music of that time, I tell myself I was a hippie in a past life, and I'm still feeling the effects of the drugs!!!

I'm often too naturally happy for my own good that I don't need them.

You have to talk to your kids, though... I wouldn't divulge your own experience with drugs, unless they ask. And, if they aren't ready for ALL the details(like when they ask about how they happened to pop out of Mommy's stomach), be vague, but never flat out lie. Later on, after being an open father, you'll most likely have quite mature young adults who would perhaps also benefit from learning about their father's past.

You don't need an artificial stimulant to enjoy life... Drugs are costly, de-humanizing, harmful... Survivable, yes... So when peer pressure steps in, please have your child weigh the risks-- how would he/she feel if a parent saw them!?? a grandparent!?? A younger sibling!?? It's not cool, although it is often glorified. Does the child really want to take days spent ENJOYING the nintendo, a sunny day, his/her friends, and have it all ripped off by a drug that could put him into the hospital, the gutter, or land him/her in jail!??

Hummmm... a tricky proposition. First, I'm not too sure if it's a good thing to keep your personal experiences from your children, should they ask. As a parent you have the unique opportunity share the things you have learned in life with your children, and try to help them not to have to learn some things the hard way. But that won't be effective if they feel you are not someone they can trust.

I dabbled with loads of drugs in my youth, and am fortunate that none of them ever caught hold of me. Many of the people I hung out with at that time are still fighting various addiction issues. I think the main reason I got involved in the drug culture was as a means of gaining acceptance among my peers. Cause I was a strange child, and the people who used drugs always had some common ground and would accept anyone else into their clique who would party. That was very important to me at that point in time. It helped to alleviate the isolation I felt from my family and much of the rest of humanity.

So I guess the other part of the solution would be to make sure--make it a priority in your life--to show your children, and their friends, how wonderful the world really is. If they have enough of the joy in life to fall back on, it might make them think twice before they put themselves at risk of losing or damaging it all.

This is a subject I tend to stay well clear of because everyone has deeply held beliefs, and one of the quickest ways of blowing friendships into smithereens is to find out you disagree about drugs.

But... the only two drugs used in the West which are used less than they were 5, 10, 15 and 20 years ago are alcohol and nicoteen. All others are increasing in use. Also - many of the problems with drugs come about because of their criminality, or because of poor quality, not because of the drugs themselves.

People make the choices they make based on their beliefs and values. If your children have a strong sense of self-worth, and if their values include taking personal responsibility for themselves, then drugs will be less appealing to them.

Most of the education progammes presuppose some level of self-worth and personal responsibility, and the reason they don't work is because of the large number of people whose personal histories loused up any chance of them developing either.

I used to smoke, and still occasionally blag a roll-up off people. I do drink, (currently - but not concurrently - red wine or dark rum). I have smoked the odd joint in my time, but I am truly terrified by the memory loss which I noticed with cannabis. But I loved it, and would use it regularly if I could do so without trashing my brain. I never took hallucigens, because I was too scared of my subconscious; I have since done a lot of meditating and visualisation, and know that I need not be afraid of my own mind, but hallucigens still don't appeal. I never tried acid because I was not prepared to have flashbacks. It certainly helped that I didn't run with a wild crowd.

My decision to stop using cannabis came about through education, and observation. It is reported to affect people's mental accuity, and I noticed it affecting mine. The decision to stop smoking came about in the same way. I knew from the education campaigns, that it really was affecting my breathing, and it was not just coincidence. Alcohol? Schmalcohol...

I don't have children, so it is very simple for me to sit here and pontificate.

But what I would do is do everything I could to

1) boost my childrens' self esteem

2) increase their ability to take decisions for themselves, and to abide by the consequences of those decisions, good or bad; ie not rescue them from minor cock-ups

3) help them set and achieve goals (how old are they? helping them set the goal and keep focussed on saving up to buy a pack of Pokemon cards, or a pair of trainers, for example)

4) admit that drugs feel great, but educate them realistically about the positive and negative effects, this has to be honest and with integrity - children are the best bullsh*t detectors in the world

5) make sure they know I loved them

6) hope, pray and trust that the first five had worked

These are my own beliefs and experiences; I am not trying to persuade other people to change their beliefs, and I would never say that someone elses experiences are any less (or more) valid than mine.

From my own experiences with drugs myself and one parent who was a drug additct and one who was an alcoholic it is usually better to be honest with your children. If you let them know what happened to you and how badly things got messed up it might help them try to not repeat the mistakes you made.

Kids are going to experiment with drugs and drinking but when parents lie to thier children it usually only makes things worse. My parents lied to me and my brother and we both came very close to going over the edge because we didn't understand.

A lot of the drug skits at schools are made out to be a joke by the kids. They may help some kids but most think it wont happen to them. They don't know the person or what thier stuation was. It helps alot when you know the person and you have seen the damage they can cause.

I still drink but gave up drugs it was a chioce I made for myself. I don't look down on anyone else doing drugs its just not my choice. I think the worst part was losing friends that, I thought cared, who didn't want to be around me anymore because I didn't get high anymore.

It's a very hard thing to go through and to explain but when it comes to kids they may understand better coming from you rather then someone who they are not as close to. And they may also gain a little more respect knowing thier parents are normal people who screw up sometimes.

I followed your link Pierce... Eeek! Don't make me think about drugs and Mair (now 13) just before I climb into my pit as I'm either going to have nightmares all night or not get a wink of sleep! LOL!

We've talked about drugs and I've been completely honest with her regarding my past experiences involving both alcohol and drugs, in the hope that she won't follow in my footsteps. (Mair's quite shocked that her straight-laced and middle-aged mother "has a past"! )

However, I guess that Mair will just have to make her own mistakes as she grows up and that if ever she needs advice or help, will come to me for it.

Thank you all. So far the responses have been very interesting and helpful indeed!

Hmmm... where does one start?
The difficulty with helping/advising your offspring always comes down to whether you can overcome the 'don't do as I do, do as I say' phase!
There are 4 issues here really: drugs, smoking, drinking and sex... yes... that can become an addiction also!
If you are a normal, healthy adult the chances are that you have experience with at least one of these, which doesn't make you an expert but certainly gives you a slight edge over your offspring!
I always tried to be fully open with my children, but used the old adage 'moderation in all things'.
I dabbled with pot at college, and have continued to use it, in very moderate proportions, ever since.
I came late to smoking really, did at college, gave up when I was pregnant and only started again after a fairly truamatic year.
Drinking... again I started at an early age, but try to stick to beer and/or rum and have a handy built-in consumption checker which means I rarely actually end up blotto!
Sex... well, if you have children and are married you are obviously experiencing this, but if you are divorced and your children meet your ~new~ partners, then they know that you are 'at it'anyway!
So... what do you say to them?
Be as honest and as open as you can! They aren't fools! Talk about everything to them. Explain what effect your habits have had on your own life, if neccessary use examples. Personally I agree with an earlier posting. I have never extended my drug use beyond weed, hash, whatever you want to call it. Frankly hallucigens scare me, E's scare me, I saw what LSD did to some of my friends, what 'uppers'and 'downers' did, even the much harder drugs. You cannot say to your children 'Don't do this', if you are doing it, but you can try to get across the dangers they risk.
This is true for all the 4 issues mentioned above.
I was pleased when one of my daughters felt comfortable telling me that she wanted sex with her boyfriend when she was 15 1/2. She wanted me to advise her, go to the family planning clinic with her, and generally talk about it. I know that she was technically underage, that I would have preferred her to wait, but I also knew what I was like at that age. If I'd have denied her, she would have gone off and done it anyway, at least this way I had some control over the situation.
My son found it quite amusing, when I went away and left him in charge of the house, to find... amongst the usual 'don't forget to feed the cat, put the milk bottles out, lock the doors at night etc etc notes, one warning him to use condoms for aids protection. I'm not sure that his girlfriend at the time found it quite so funny though! LOL
So... try to be as open as possible, temper your explanations/opinions for their age... it's no good going into great detail with a 4 year old for instance...
Be true to yourself, then you can be true to your children
shazzPRME

at least what? Shazz? Hello girl, where u at?


It's all good and well to pledge yourself to openness and frankness as a parent, so as not to estrange your kid from you and thus hope to keep them 'on your side' and away from drugs, but have you any idea of their attraction to a kid, as an exploring adolescent? Do you remember how cool they were when you tried them yourself?

Your kid is going to want to try them and if you smother them with openness and frank words about how it's so much cooler saying 'no' and the dangers, chances are you're going to backfire on yourself, going as a parent from the authoritarian 'when i say no it's no' type to another, much more scary type: the 'when i say no it's because i'm your father AND your friend'. creepy.

What I have expreienced my parents doing with regard to drugs (and, I hate to say (), I appreciate them for it), is a policy of tolerance. They have never said no to me about drugs. They have allowed me to experiment with them, party on them, have bad experiences with them etc. This attitude made me very frank with them.
I could tell them what I was getting myself into and how I felt about it, and if thy had any feedback, I'd get it. If they were really concerned, I'd hear that. But no stifling over-anxiety. They knew I was merely experimenting, and that was fine.

My point is rally, that you shouldn't delude yourself as a parent into thinking that if you are frank and open as a parent, your kid is going to be the same towards you. Kids are excellent actors, and while they tell you one thing, they may easily fool you. To get them to be frank with you is the trick.

A policy of tolerance and respect for the fact that your children are going to experiment is a nice ideal, I think. But if I were a parent (and I'm not) I think I would be scared to death NOT to try to set frimer guidelines these days. Because the drugs out there are totally different from what was available when I was a kid. When I was 16 I tried LSD. And I was a little scared of having a bad trip. But curiosity won over my fear. Today I would love to try X, but won't do it because you never know what it is that you are taking. And I have run across too many people over the years who are permanently messed up due to drug use to take that risk. That is the only thing that stops me, though. And few kids will have had that kind of exposure, enough to make them say to themselves...hummmmm... statistically almost everyone comes out fine, but it still isn't worth being in that small percent.

The other problem with a tolerant attitude is that some people seem to be more prone to addiction than others. And I don't think you can tell who's going to be caught until they are. That becomes a lifelong tragedy for those with addiction to drugs. I couldn't forgive myself for condoning the potential to addiction. Not everybody gets bored and walks away.

Finally, people who are under the influence of some of these powerful new chemicals really have no control over what happens to them. Had a coworker staying with me for a week last spring because she lost EVERYTHING when she was out partying one night. Almost got killed in the bargain. We got together and got her an apartment, and some strings were pulled to keep her job, because we all felt sorry for her. She was an intelligent person too, not just a waste. But a couple of weeks after her scare (and that was only one in a long string of them) she was back into it all again. She lost her job, her apartment, and disappeared. Was planning to move to South Beach and become a dancer to support her habits, last I heard. I really would be surprised to find she is still alive at this point. The thing is, she had all the support you could ask for, financially and otherwise, from family and friends. The call of the addiction was just too strong for her to manage. That is the scary part of the whole thing.

I have to disagree with you on one point, brain: You say "you never know what it is that you are taking" (these days). Well, back then we didn't either, as I recall it. What we bought as "genuine mescaline" and "pure LSD" often turned out to be amphetamine - or even C-vitamin-pills...

But I think you are VERY right in saying "some people seem to be more prone to addiction than others. And I don't think you can tell who's going to be caught until they are".

I was astonished (to say the least) when I found out that I was actually able to stop smoking pot. Later I found out that I could even stop smoking at all - and quit drinking for weeks!!! (I still do it once or twice every year, BTW - but that's another story).

I'm not going to get into my experiances with durgs, alcohol, and the like. I am going to say that the most important factor in kids and drugs is their parents. Plain and simple. In America, the "war on drugs" was lost before it started. It took 200 years for the first million people to be in jail, and ten for the next. 99% of those are non-violent drug offences( you get more time for simple possesion than murder in a lot of cases) Remember, more people drank during prohibition, then before. If parents spend time with their kids and have an open relationship with them, then the risk is almost gone. Sure, there's peer presure, but the people who give in are looking for love and acceptance, they're missing from home. Take the billions spent on fighting drugs, make them legal, and you'll have less addicts, and more money to help the ones who need it. There will be less crime, less overdoses(no more bleach and soap used to cut it) Remember, the more laws you make, the more criminals you have. Words don't get the job done, actions and attatudes do.

Just my opinion, feel free to disagree, flame or hate me. If you make sense, I might change. That's why it's an opinion and not a fact.

Brain,
that's exactly my point. As a parent, it must be extremely scary to set guidelines that leave room for experimenting. But if your kid can experiment while stil feeling secure within the guidelines his/er parent has set, s/he'll probably feel secure as well in telling you all about it. That gives you a good check on the relative safety of it.

When the kid wants to experiment, but the rules are too strict, there's a dilemma. I think that any curious kid is going to find a way out of that dilemma and experiment anyway, only then while not telling you. That leaves the parent in the dark, even more scared,
and without any checks. Friends of mine with strict parents used to come over to my place to smoke pot, and while I felt perfectly safe and watched over while I was exploring, they had too keep quiet about it for fear of huge fights at home.

Like I said before, it's a tricky proposition. Otherwise, it would not be an issue because someone would have found an answer. I guess all I can do is opinionate here. And my opinion is that kids need their parents to be strong for them, sometimes. Like anything human, it all depends on the people involved, and the kind of relationships they have. Some people are going to respond better to a firm rule and fewer options, and others will do better when told to do what you must, but do it at home where someone can be there for you if you need it.

And Pierce--you're right. But I really do think that there is a frightening shift in the additives and substitutes used in drugs now as opposed to 15 or 20 years ago. Because then I think it was more often an opportunist deluding purchasers for financial gain but with no intent to harm. Today it seems there are more vicious people out there who will put really dangerous chemicals out there. I'm not sure why. Maybe they want to hurt people, just to see what will happen. Or maybe they think that they are giving better value, some kind of high, if not the one they're advertising. Could be a number of reasons. Can't prove it, but that is what I see.

jimiejaz, "Take the billions spent on fighting drugs, make them legal, and you'll have less addicts, and more money to help the ones who need it" is an idea that I can fully support (and have been for some time now, actually!). I know we are hoping in vain, though (as you probably realise?): Organised drugdealers are opposed to it (because their entire market would collapse) as well as a lot of ignorant politicians (and voters).

Brain, I am sorry to say that you could be right too: I have heard about X filled with rat-poison. At least the C-vitamins I bought in my youth were very healthy - if somewhat expensive...

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Thank you! I even heard recently that it relieves sclerosis. Heard it on national radio none the less!